The Wall Street Journal's front page yesterday. The newspaper has ridiculed the accusation that it was using the photograph to suggest that Ms Kagan is gay

'Coming to the plate' is the American baseball equivalent of 'coming to the wicket' - or readying oneself for action.

The White House has reportedly issued off the record denials that Ms Kagan is gay. When asked officially, Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs replied: 'It’s not anything I’m going to get into.'

Ms Kagan has not commented on the rumours either.

However with rumours about her sexual preferences reaching the Washington Post and openly discussed on Capitol Hill, gay and lesbian rights activists took offence at the image.

'Personally I think the newspaper, which happens to have the largest
circulation of any in the U.S., might as well have gone with a headline
that said, 'Lesbian or switch-hitter?'' the Dallas Voice's
John Wright told Politico.

'It clearly is an allusion to her being gay. It's just too easy a punch
line,' Cathy Renna, a former spokesperson for the Gay and Lesbian
Alliance Against Defamation who is now a consultant, told the Washington-based blog.

The Journal ridiculed the suggestion as 'absurd'.

'If you turn the photo upside down, reverse the pixilation and
simultaneously listen to Abbey Road backwards, while reading Roland
Barthes, you will indeed find a very subtle hidden message,' a spokesman told Politico.

Other gay rights groups also slammed the objections as hypersensitive, including conservative gay group GOProud.